The Wall (26 page)

and dramatically died. You look like you could use a drink.' This last

was said dryly.

Sara's eyes were saucers at his extraordinary disclosures, and she

whispered, 'I think I could, please.' His mouth twisted, but he went to

fix her one, pouring a stiff brandy for himself. Then he settled back

on the couch, after giving her the glass.

'Andrea's father raised all hell. To make a long, sordid story as short

as possible, the press treated the matter like bloodthirsty hounds,

snapping up the titbits that her father threw at them. The story was

sensational news at the time. I don't suppose you read about it?'

She numbly shook her head. 'I was in California. I might not have

noticed, anyway, even if the story had been circulated out there, but I

don't think it would have got that far West.' He was telling her

something devastatingly important, she knew that, but as yet she

hadn't grasped the implications of everything he was trying to say.

'I lost my job with the law firm from the pressure Andrea's father was

exerting,' he said quietly. 'I lost several "friends" over the whole

affair, and most important of all, I lost my privacy. I don't want to tell

you about that. I had to move in an effort to regain some measure of

peace. Eventually, everything culminated into a trial. It was my first

shot at both the defence and being the defendant, and it was a most

illuminating experience. I never went back to prosecution again. I

could never live with myself if, by any chance, I'd put an innocent

person through that particular kind of hell.

'Eventually I was acquitted through lack of evidence, which was

quite relieving.' At that dry statement, Sara gripped her glass so hard,

she feared it might break from the pressure. 'Mrs Owen's testimony

was my sole defence—that, and the fact that a few of the guests

remembered me approaching her body from the downstairs hall, not

from the top of the stairs. And of course, during the court

proceedings, all the sordid details of her extra-marital flings were

dragged out into the open and duly noted for the sensation-seeking

public.' His succinct wording, coupled with the concerned look she

threw him, revealed to her just how badly he was hurt by the whole

nightmare. She had been right, after all. Greg had gone through hell,

and he was still bleeding from the wounds. His supremely bitter

glance glittered at her, and he asked her mockingly, 'Does it bother

you, Sara, to know that I might possibly be a murderer?'

Her own eyes widened with shock at that, and she stared at him

speechlessly a few moments before answering. He really was worried

what she thought of him! That repelling look was back in his eyes,

she saw, and a hard mask clamped down on his features, and she was

suddenly sure that it was fear that made him look that way. She

sipped from her glass and asked him, deliberately casual, 'Greg,

would you answer an irrelevant question for me?'

'If I can.' His face never altered or softened, and his body was held

tense as though he expected a blow.

'Did you tell me a true story a few nights ago, about when you put

putty in all of your neighbour's locks?' She stared into the fire calmly

as she waited for his reply, sensing the puzzled glance he threw at

her.

'Yes, I did.' He fell silent, waiting.

She turned her head and smiled at him serenely. 'You never killed

your wife, Greg. Nobody with that fine a sense of conscience so

young could. Were you really worried that I might think you did?

Shame on you!'

She felt his body relax slightly, but not totally, and she suddenly

knew that everything was not over yet. 'I thought perhaps you might,'

he admitted carefully, 'but that wasn't all I was worried about.' He

paused slightly, and she knew an inexplicable fear. 'I hope to God,' he

finished quietly, 'that I never see another reporter again in my life.'

The words were a physical blow to her. She had just begun to see all

of what Greg was trying to say to her, but she still didn't guess it all.

She still wasn't quite to the whole truth.

'Greg,' she whispered, through stiff lips. It was time to tell him who

she really was. He had the right to know, after all he had just

confessed to her. 'Greg, I have something I need to confess, too,

and—and I don't know how to say it.' She stopped and looked at him,

her mouth dry, lips shaking. She couldn't go on. He would hate her

for not telling him before. He would hate what she was.

He sat there, passively waiting. His face was gravely attentive, but

his eyes were raw. 'The best way to say it is the simplest, Sara.'

'Oh, Greg!' she said, and it was a cry of pain. 'My professional name

is Sara Bertelli, and I'm as public as you can get, I'm in the news, I'm

always under exposure, I—I sign autographs, dammit, and…'

'I know,' he said quietly.

Of all the terrible revelations that night, this one hit her the hardest.

She closed her eyes tight and doubled up, whispering, 'Oh, my God!

When did you figure it out?'

Greg brooded into his brandy glass before answering. 'I couldn't

figure out why you looked so familiar to me at first. When I saw the

piano in your house and noticed how peculiarly cautious you were

being, it all clicked into place. I have most of your records, and your

face is on the majority of the covers.'

He had known. That was why he had acted so strangely that night; he

had known all along. Her knees were raised, and she leaned her

forehead on them so that he couldn't see the tears sliding down her

cheeks. 'I tried to tell you several times, but the longer I didn't, the

harder it was to confess. I—wanted you not to know, Greg, I'm sorry.

I thought you hadn't recognised me.'

'Oh, Sara, you dear little fool,' he sighed, stroking her hair. 'How

could I not, with that face and body? You underrate yourself, my

dear. I would have seen it sooner or later. In fact, I was determined

not to see you again, but I had to come back that night; and the fact

that I couldn't stay away made me deeply angry, and I ended up

taking it out on you. I went home cursing myself, sure that the next

time I saw you I would tell you goodbye, and there you were,

sobbing on my doorstep, so small and frightened and vulnerable. I

couldn't walk away!'

'I love you,' she choked out desperately. 'I love you!'

'And I you,' he responded immediately, roughly, laying his head

down on her shoulder. 'You gave me more in that one night of loving

than Andrea did in three long years. Sara, I won't face the cheap

publicity and invasion of my privacy again. Not after what had

happened five years ago.'

She began to realise the direction his speech was taking, for the first

time that night picking up the implications of what Greg was

communicating, and she tried frantically to hide from the rest of his

words by covering up her ears with her hands. But he was relentless,

and he came down to kneel beside her, forcing down her hands so

that she had to hear what he was saying.

'I love you, Sara, and it's really love for the first time in my life. You

mean so much to me; you're so many different things rolled up into

one delightful person!

You're beautiful, and you're funny, and deeply thoughtful. You're

sensitive and fragile, and frighteningly vulnerable. You're kind, and

compassionate, and you're a terrible invalid, but I love even that

aspect of you! I want to marry you,' he said harshly, pain etched in

every feature. 'I want that wild vitality that you pour into your music,

I want your body beside me every night. I can't live your kind of life,

Sara!'

She was shaking her head from side to side, in protest at what he was

saying to her, and his hands tightened on her shoulders with the

urgency of his speech, shaking her to make her acknowledge what

she was hearing. 'No!' she cried. 'There can be compromises, Greg,

and things worked out -'

He went right on speaking, over her protests, as if he didn't hear a

word of what she was saying to him. 'You're going to have to make a

choice! You can't have both me and your career.'

'Don't say it, Greg!' she sobbed, struggling to get out of his hold and

away from his terrible ultimatum. 'For God's sake, don't ask it of me!

I can't
take
this, damn you -'

He shook her harder. 'You've got to listen, Sara! You've got to pick

one or the other, there's no other way. I'm sorry.' Then he let her go,

as if he had only just realised what he had been doing to her, and she

stumbled to her feet.

'I can't take any more tonight, I just can't!' she said brokenly, backing

sharply away from him as he stood to tower above her. 'Don't touch

me! I don't want you to get near me, do you hear? I—oh, hell, I have

to get out of here!' And with that, she grabbed the afghan off the back

of the couch and dashed for the back door.

He came after her. 'Please don't go out there—it's cold, and you've

been sick. Will you just listen to me a minute, Sara? Don't -'

She slammed the door on his words and ran out into the night. A chill

wind touched her exposed neck, and she shivered violently, wrapping

the afghan around her tightly for warmth. Then she headed down the

path to the beach, unhappiness dogging her footsteps and confusion

preying on her mind.

The feeling that she was being torn in two came back to her, stronger

and more anguishing than before. She must have had a premonition,

that night in California. She must have suspected something of this

nature happening.

She felt like she was in shock, deadened throughout her limbs. She

had sustained too many blows that night, had absorbed too much

vital information. Her emotions were tangled and raw, and her

thoughts too agitated. Greg had offered her something she had

thought she wanted more than anything else in the world, but at such

a painful price. She couldn't think about it.

The night was illuminated with a pale moonlight glow that was at

once subtle and yet piercing clean, keenly cutting through the senses.

Sara could see quite clearly. The shadows were bigger at night and

more black, and the colouring was very surrealistic. Everything

ranged from a pearly shade of ivory to dark violets and midnight

blue. She picked her way delicately down to the beach and looked

out on the shimmery sands in the pale light. The water was fairly

calm, lapping gently against the shore. It looked peaceful. Just letting

her gaze -wander out over the huge lake induced a feeling of calm

and peace. It was what she had needed so badly. It was a refuge, for a

while.

She huddled into the blanket and settled herself on the sand, staring

blindly out. The entire conversation from that evening was played

and replayed in her mind, like a broken recording and a repetitive,

jumping phonograph needle.

Everything made sense now; every inexplicable response of Greg's,

every puzzling inflection in his voice, every hidden motive. Of

course he was wary of strangers! Who wouldn't be, after what he had

been through? The wonder of it was that he had allowed himself to

get close to her in the first place.

That was the one thing that she had sensed in Greg, that he had in

common with herself: loneliness. He had been just as compelled

towards her as she had been to him. Isolated so completely like he

had been, it was only natural, a totally human response. Two lonely

people finding kindred spirits in each other, but was it really love that

he felt for her? Could he just be reacting against all the self-imposed

isolation of the last five years? She couldn't know for sure.

She felt such racking torment, two such completely opposite desires.

One half of her wanted to reach out with both hands and grasp at

whatever Greg was willing to give her, and the other half yearned for

the life that she had so briefly left. She could never go back to the

crippling ambition in her previous life, but could she give up

something that was so tied to the essence of her personality? How

could she give it up?

The minutes slowly trickled into hours, and the hours slowly washed

away the night. Sara never moved. She' was never aware of the dark